Icy's Better Horses

⚠️ Required dependencies: GeckoLib and Modonomicon. Minecraft 1.20.1 uses Patchouli instead of Modonomicon. Fabric versions also require Fabric API.

A complete overhaul of horse progression, travel, breeding, ownership, and mounted gameplay for Minecraft.

Icy's Better Horses turns horses from disposable transport into long-term companions. Tame a horse, build a bond with it, equip it for the journey, breed stronger foals, pull carts, fight from the saddle, and keep track of every horse you own.

Only interested in the models and animations? Check out Icy's Horse Breeds instead.

Breeds, classes, and genetics

Better Horses adds fifteen real horse breeds, each with its own models, coat palettes, biome ranges, stats, class, and special ability.

The five horse classes are built for different jobs:

• Race horses focus on speed.
• War horses are dependable in combat.
• Western horses are versatile working mounts.
• Draft horses are powerful, durable, and able to pull large wagons.
• Pony breeds are smaller, agile, and useful in tighter spaces.

Every horse carries persistent genetics for its gender, breed, coat, health, speed, and jump strength. Foals inherit traits from their parents, mixed breeds are possible, and careful breeding can produce horses stronger than either parent.

Each breed also has its own ability that improves as your bond grows. These range from combat and survival perks to faster bonding, healing, terrain resistance, herding, wall-breaking, and more.

The full breed list, coat variations, abilities, and spawn biomes are available in the Stable Handbook and on the official wiki.

Ownership and bonding

Taming a horse makes it permanently yours and activates the rest of the mod for that horse.

Every owned horse has a bond level from 0 to 100. Spending time nearby, brushing it, naming it, and feeding it golden apples raises its bond. Every 20 bond grants a speed and jump bonus, reaching +75% at maximum bond.

Owned horses also gain:

• Protection against other players taking the reins or removing their equipment
• A radial command wheel with Follow, Stay, Wander, Set Home, and Return Home
• Whistling, allowing your active horse to return to you
• A live horse roster containing every horse you own
• The ability to trust selected players with /horse trust <player>
• Revival through the roster if horse revival is enabled

Your roster shows each horse's location and status. From there, you can set an active horse, whistle it, send it home, disown it, or bring back a fallen companion.

Better riding and travel

Better Horses removes much of the friction from mounted travel:

• Four gaits: Walk, Trot, Canter, and Gallop
• Auto-ride: Double-tap forward and steer with the mouse
• Free look: Look around without immediately turning your horse
• Improved swimming: Horses float instead of sinking
• Leaf passthrough: Ride through foliage without getting stuck
• Raised step height: Walk over small elevation changes without jumping
• Mounted mining: Break most blocks at normal speed while riding
• Horse transparency: Look down to fade your horse and see the ground beneath you
• Two riders: Bring another player along as a passenger
• Rearing: Make your horse rear on command

Hold an Upgraded Saddle while looking at a horse to inspect its gender, breed, coat, bond, health, speed, and jump before deciding whether to tame it.

Tack, storage, and carts

The Upgraded Saddle unlocks the horse's equipment and stats screen.

Depending on the horse and version, equipment includes:

• A Chest or Ender Chest for portable storage
• Horseshoes for safer footing, reduced fall damage, and Frost Walker support
• A Medkit that automatically activates when the horse is badly hurt
• A Glidewing Harness that deploys during dangerous falls
• Carpet blankets and decorative banners
• A Horse Cart for passengers, cargo, or farming

Carts can carry players and mobs, hold a double chest, or take a hoe to become a working plough. Draft horses can upgrade their cart into a larger six-seat wagon with additional cargo space.

Mounted combat

Horses can charge enemies at a gallop, kick targets behind them, defend their owners, and use class and breed abilities.

Charge strength depends on the horse's class and momentum. Horses may panic during combat until they trust you, while War horses remain steady under pressure.

Mounted combat, horse PvP, class abilities, breed abilities, and other combat systems can be changed or disabled through the server configuration.

Stable Handbook and configuration

The in-game Stable Handbook explains every breed, class, ability, item, recipe, and major system, including live previews of horses and carts.

Better Horses also includes a server-authoritative configuration covering ownership, breeding, riding, combat, abilities, horse revival, equipment, HUD settings, keybinds, and balance values.

Disabled equipment remains in the game and keeps rendering, but becomes inactive. This lets servers simplify the mod without deleting existing items or damaging established worlds.

Install Mod Menu and Cloth Config on Fabric to edit the settings in-game. They are optional; the JSON configuration can always be edited directly.

Better Horses must be installed on both the client and server.

The main maintained release is Minecraft 26.2 Fabric. Older releases are available for other Minecraft versions and mod loaders, although not every branch receives the same level of maintenance.

Check the Files or Versions page for the exact Minecraft version, loader, and dependency requirements of the release you download.

Q: Do I need this mod on the server?

Yes. Better Horses adds entities, items, world data, and server-controlled gameplay systems, so it must be installed on both sides.

Q: Can my friends ride my horses?

They can ride behind you as passengers. Use /horse trust <player> to let a specific player ride, command, and access the equipment of every horse you own.

Q: Can I add this to an existing world?

Yes. Existing horses are converted automatically and assigned a breed. Their appearance may change once during conversion.

Q: Where was AI used in this mod?

AI was only used to help fix bugs I couldn't resolve myself and assist with porting the mod to other Minecraft versions.

The codebase and architecture are entirely my own. All models, textures, icons, animations, and UI assets were handmade by the artists credited below.

Q: Can I include Better Horses in my modpack?

Yes, feel free to include it.

Q: Can I repost the mod to another website?

No. Redistribution and reposting to other websites are not permitted.

• goozt — horse cart animations
• funado — cart textures and most adult horse models and textures
• mrsketchystuff — UI backgrounds and textures for most items
• FreshLX — permission to repurpose animations from Fresh Animations